“I can remember looking over at my brother who was still asleep. I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t. I was too scared so I laid there, not speaking, thinking about the innocence I would never get back. He hurt me in the worst way that night.”
‘Don’t tell nobody. I’ll give you some money when I get paid,’ he said as he was getting off me. I was scared out of my mind. My uncle, my favorite uncle, had hurt me.’
‘He was just gone. I came home one night to the apartment my boyfriend and I shared to find everything was missing. He terminated our lease and emptied our joint bank account.’
“Just a few weeks later, I woke up one morning feeling ‘different.’ I really can’t explain it, because it didn’t make any sense. But something in me, knew. I sat shaking with a pregnancy test in my hands. My body was barely functioning. But against all odds, two pink lines appeared.”
‘What did you do to your child!’ I hadn’t grasped the accusation, I could see the fractures. He continued, ‘I’ve ordered a full CAT scan to determine if you caused brain damage to your daughter!’
“I couldn’t understand how, but there was the evidence right in front of me. Undeniable proof that she indeed was hurt and hurt badly. How could my precious little one-month old baby have four broken bones at once!”
‘A boy told me I shouldn’t wear shirts that show my scars. He said they are scary. I just want to be normal,’ she sobbed.’
“On a rushed morning, I threw her a tank top and asked her to get dressed. She quietly asked me for a different shirt. Oblivious and in a hurry, I said, ‘Why? You love that one. Just put it on, we gotta go.’ Tears formed in her eyes.”
‘He said, ‘I know she can’t go home,’ and was quiet the rest of the ride. Dad couldn’t get his coat off fast enough. He sat beside her, so happy to see her, saying how much he loved her.’
“She was staring straight ahead. That didn’t matter to him. He was back with his Mary Jane. I noticed it was quiet. I look over and Dad is laying on her shoulder sobbing – not crying, sobbing. After my tears started, I went in their bathroom wanted to scream. So these are the golden years?”
‘We knew it was time to go. We wheeled Sophie down to a cooling room. We could see past her imperfections, her peeling skin and her bluish tint. To us, she was our baby and she was perfect.’
“She had so much brown, curly hair. She had her daddy’s nose and her mamma’s lips. Her perfect little lips. I wanted to kiss those lips every day.”
‘He told his friend ‘I feel off,’ and collapsed. Micah busted the front door down to get to my son’s wife. By the time she got to him, he was gray with his eyes rolled upward.’
“‘Mom, come here,’ she said. I replied, ‘Just a minute.’ She yelled louder, ‘Mom come here NOW!’ She handed me the phone and said, ‘Michael is getting CPR.’ I had to have her repeat what she said. I was in shock.”
‘My son has until this Tuesday to turn himself in. I love you, Josh. But the DEVIL returned this year. I made the decision to send my son to jail.’
“Yesterday he called. He wanted to come home. He even gave me the address where he was staying. I made the most difficult decision; I called the police to let them know where he was.”
‘Fifteen days after this picture was taken, this sweet girl’s dad – her best friend, was diagnosed with terminal cancer. She would only have him 18 more months.’
“What you see in this picture, and what I see in this picture, are two very different things. You might see a little girl in a hotel room, preparing for a gymnastics meet in Las Vegas, looking out on the world from her hotel room. But, I see something different.”
‘Katie, get off the couch!,’ was the last thing I heard before witnessing the shattering sound of the gun.’
“I’ll never forget looking down at my trembling hands as if I was a character in a war movie. Except, this wasn’t fictional. This was real and raw and urgent; no life experience could have prepared me for the intensity of what I was to see, hear, feel, and ache over.”
